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Turns out consumers have a lot to say about net neutrality.
The public appears to have given the FCC an earful on the subject, lodging more than 21,000 complaints with the FCC’s Consumer Help Center.
The data, available through the FCC’s freshly launched Consumer Complaint Data Center, shows net neutrality complaints overall ranked just behind billing complaints and significantly ahead of availability and speed complaints.
The complete data set includes complaints lodged against all providers of wireless and wireline phone, Internet and TV service with the FCC’s Consumer Help Center since October 31, 2014.
But the filtered data shows something interesting: net neutrality appears to be at the bottom of the list of concerns for wireless phone users.
Among wireless phone consumers, the chief complaints were the twin terrors of telemarketing and robocalls, with 88,920 and 44,953 complaints, respectively. While the vast majority of wireless telemarketing and robocalls spam appears to come via voice calls, nearly 5,700 wireless complaints specified a text message as the method of delivery.
Billing was the next most popular grievance with 21,116 complaints, while availability and privacy rounded out the top five with 6,117 and 5,974 complaints, respectively. In fact, with just 1,121 records, net neutrality complaints from wireless customers numbered fewer than those for equipment (4,075), number portability (3,925), cramming (3,857) and interference (2,089).
Thankfully for wireless customers, the FCC is tackling the issue of unwanted calls and texts.
In releasing its consumer complaint data, the FCC said it is hoping to help enable better do-not-disturb technologies. Last May, the FCC also proposed new rules that would require consumer consent to receive robocalls.
The commission is also considering regulating SMS messaging under Title II, but has been discouraged from doing so by carriers who have said such regulation would prevent them from implementing spam controls that have hitherto been successful at protecting consumers.
Filed Under: Industry regulations
